Walking a Different Path
by Jai Rose
Summary: Gender-Bender AU. Glen is one of the survivors of the Zombie Apocalypse. Even almost a month in, it's getting harder to stay human. Especially when the rest of the world throws humanity in the dirty faster than Glen could load a gun. Not OC/Anyone or Slash.
1. A Little Thing Called Life

So, hello readers. New and old alike!

I have a confession, (which really isn't much of a confession) - I am new to writing "Walking Dead fan fiction"! **BUT** I have read enough of what is out there - along with the show itself - that I think I've got some of the characters worked out. And since this is an AU, I've taken some _major_ liberties with one of our favorite characters.

And well. The change from man to woman can not be understated. ^.^

I originally started writing this story because of a challenge to myself. I wanted to write a Gender-Bender ever since... well, forever really. And I thought, what better universe to use than the Walking Dead? Where literally everyone dies and nobody is safe!

And I love these two characters (Daryl and Glenn)! So I thought, why not?

And this is what I came up with! :P

**Summary**: Gender-Bender AU. Glen is one of the survivors of the Zombie Apocalypse. Even almost a month in, it's getting harder to stay human. Especially when the rest of the world throws humanity in the dirty faster than Glen could load a gun.

_**- Warnings**_: Cursing. **-**

* * *

**Walking a Different Path  
**

**-  
**_A Little Thing Called Life_

* * *

Heart pounding, fingers fidgeting with a nervous-tick, eyes unable to stay on one thing for longer than a split second; these were just a few of Glen's symptoms of surviving the Apocalypse. There were more. There always were more, but these were the most prominent. Insomnia was the newest one to add to Glen's ever growing list.

Her companion suffered from a few of her symptoms as well and then a few more of his own. Namely asthma, which made it a bitch to keep track of him without the Geeks keeping tabs on him as well. When he had a small attack, it was like the biggest 'I'm here' call ever.

Doug, the short fifteen year old ginger-haired kid, was standing behind Glen, rifle smashed against his chest and watching the door they had filed through with trepidation. His fingers were shaking but strong against his weapon, even if they weren't on the trigger. His usual smile was gone from his freckled face as he didn't dare take his eyes away from where they currently were. And his breathing was not good.

Glen had found Doug in a bean field, starving more than she was and clutching a rifle to his chest. His clothes had been splattered with blood. There were a few dead-**dead** people around him, shot twice in the head each. Each shot was so professional it was scary, which made Glen weary of the pitiful child. The kid had been crying, but had managed to level the gun at Glen and stutter out a warning. There was a moment of heart-to-heart "don't kill me" blurble - Then they'd been practically swarmed by Walkers, fought them off, and afterwards just kind of stared at each other. Cogs turning in each other's brain's.

It was a no-brainer to stick together after that. Since Doug knew how to handle a weapon, Glen was more than willing to deal with his age and imperfections. Doug had to put up with her as well, but she had stealth and efficiency on her side.

She was more of a boon than anything.

After the first meeting, as they had both been walking towards Glen's truck she'd 'stolen' a while back Doug told her the significance of the two dead people behind him. His mother and father. It wasn't soon after that Glen grew to be... well, protective was too weak a word - Territorial and motherly was probably better. Doug barely knew what hit him in that regard.

That was almost a week ago. At the moment, Glen was sitting on the very top of a short and squat building, all doors she and her companions had found were closed firmly and quietly as soon as she had arrived in a flurry of movement and action. Even though there had only been two rickety old, steel doors, total; one couldn't be too careful. Especially with the body-munchers around.

Glen didn't even stop the shiver as she thought of the... _things _that were now outnumbering humanity. Doug had a variety of names for them. Ranging from Walkers to Geeks and Zombies. And there followed humanity like a plague. At least in this city. The body count was surprisingly high for a city that a few miles back had boasted a population of five hundred and two. And it wasn't just this city. It was actually basically _every _city now. In fact, Glen wouldn't have dared step foot inside the tall building deathtrap of a village - if it wasn't for the fact that she and Doug were currently starving.

Doug was just a kid. And Glen was no hunter, or even semi-able bodied in providing for herself. Before the 'incident' she'd lived off of Pizza, Mountain Dew, and any fast food place within five minutes driving distance around her small apartment. If she even felt the need to eat that day.

"Dude." Glen didn't have the heart to snap at her younger companion to shut up. The kid was even younger than she was... if not stupider as well. Then again... Glen had gone to college for however short a time it had been and then dropped out.

They shared stupidity.

"I know."

"That was a close one." Doug breathed, leaning his back against the railing next to Glen.

Glen gritted her teeth. A flash of memory hitting her along with the stench of just how close the Geeks had been to her and Doug before they'd high-tailed it away. "I know."

"Like... Really, _really, _**really **- "

"**Doug**," Glen found herself snapping, running her hand through her hair to find that her ponytail had come undone. As her shaking hands snapped her hair into a ponytail, she whispered to herself, "I know how close it was."

And Glen really, really did.

From the first time the news stations had first announced a man jumping a woman in an alleyway and eating her, to the bite victims taking over the hospitals, to the crazier stories of the dead just rising at funeral homes... Glen may not have known just _how _close everything was to ending, but she wasn't surprise _when _it did.

At least, not too terribly. The dead walking was a shock, but Glen wasn't shocked with the outcome of **that **certain scenario. Humankind was just waiting for a signal to go bat-shit crazy on a good day. It was like a plotline to a terrible movie, except now that she had survived it - automatically put her in the running for first-person shooter and hero duty.

Which may or may not have anything to do with why she had taken Doug with her. No matter the liability he brought her.

"Sorry." Doug whispered, his weapon set against the railing as he hugged himself. His blues eyes staring out past her shoulder as he unfocused on the world around them. A dangerous habit, but one that kept the kid happy as he thought about the past. And if there was one thing Glen didn't want was a Debbie-downer waiting to die.

"Not your fault." Glen slurred, shoving her head into her forearm to stop the dizzying dehydration-headache. "I would just rather ignore the meat-munchers on the other side of the door for a moment, if you don't mind."

The dead started up their scratching and banging of the door, smelling the two living bodies on the other side.

"I don't mind." Doug whispered, but it sounded closer to a whimper.

_What a mess_, Glen thought to herself, looking down at the street smattered with the dead. And the walking dead. There were about twenty bodies walking around, stumbling around and sniffing towards the rooftop. It wasn't the first time Glen thanked God that the town they found themselves in was so small.

The silence of her mind was broken when the other person spoke, whom Glen had almost completely forgotten about save for the fact he was taking up surface area on their roof.

"Ya know, this coulda been worse."

Glen was so close to snapping at him too. Even if the stranger had saved them. The fact that they had had to be saved at all irked her. And by a hot red-neck nonetheless.

"Yeah, thanks for that insight, _Daryl_." Doug sassed like the teenager he was.

_The day had started out so well, too._ Glen thought to herself with a moan, wanting to ram her head against the nearest surface. The boys were now arguing behind her on what the plan of action should be yet Glen could read the undertones of 'who's got the bigger dick?'.

_It had been going so well._

* * *

"Are you sure it's safe?" Doug pestered, rifle pointing out the rolled down window as he read the map sprawled across his lap. Stars, marker markings, and other random stickers littering the document in clusters which could have been any number of things. Cities. Roads. Hoards of the dead.

"Is anywhere safe?" Glen asked with a grumble, driving her way through the obstacle course of the highway. It was a pain, but it was an easy indicator of their position to danger. The closer to towns, the closer to roadblocks. Glen knew they would only be able to drive at most another five miles before either having to off-road it or get out of the car.

The thought didn't sit well with her, but they'd only been doing this a few days. Surely it would get better.

Surely they would get better at this.

"You're not that great at this whole 'reassuring' thing," Doug said, looking over at her with a pointed look. "You know?"

Glen shoved him with a good-natured snort, "Tell me something I _don't _know."

And then it was silent for a few blessed moments as they reached the dreaded roadblock. It wasn't a roadblock in the sense that the police set it up. It was a roadblock in the sense that cars_ could not_ pass. At least half a mile of cars were now between Glen and the city.

It was the longest line of cars they'd seen since Atlanta. WHich had been almost three miles long coming out, with none going in.

Which made Glen's stomach flip and flop uncomfortably, but they needed food and water more than they needed comfort of mind at the moment. Unfortunately, this was the closest city for almost another twenty miles. Glen looked up to see the sun setting already, still high in the sky but inching its way down.

They had six - maybe five hours of sunlight left.

Glen didn't like it, but it was do-able.

"Does this mean we're walking?" Doug asked with a wrinkled nose, head halfway out the window, staring at the daunting builds in the distance.

Glen shoved the parking break into gear and then snatched the keys out of the ignition. A preventative against thieves.

"No," Glen sighed, roughly wrenching the door open as quietly as she could. "It means we're going to be running."

* * *

True to form, Glen and Doug spent half their time running. From either building to building, tree to tree, car to car, or some combination of the three. They'd seen a few Walkers, but had learned early on that as long as they were silent, still, and far enough away - the stupid dead-things stumbled right on by.

It took about two hours walking and running, where it usually - in a sane and stable society - would have taken only a half an hour. And in that time, Glen had only seen four and a half zombies. The half zombie was the only one that saw them, but was in no position to get them. Half of its body was gone from the middle of its chest to the left side of its body. The growls and snarls it made as they passed, refusing to waste bullets, would probably haunt Doug's nightmares. Glen knew the poor kid had enough of them as it was.

Somehow, Glen just wasn't as affected by the Walkers as Doug was. Maybe it was because she'd never seen anyone she knew turned into a Geek... Maybe there was something wrong with her.

It was a useful survival skill, fortunately. Everyone else's misfortune her gain.

Inside the city limits was silent, the wind whistling through the buildings the only sound. Glen held her pistol aloft, having taken it off a corpse with a missing head a few days ago. Doug was a little more confident wielding his rifle first as a baton and then as a long-range weapon second.

The silence of the city was unsettling. It was so unsettling that Glen started to experience her extreme symptoms of the apocalypse. Fidgety hands, eyes flashing every which way, and ears tuned for the first sign of a groan or moan. They were also her symptoms of survival.

And really, it wasn't a bad thing. Her paranoia. It saved her life more times in the last few weeks than she could count.

* * *

When the groan and moan did end up happening, Glen and Doug had been in the local 'Mart, clearing out whatever was left of the canned goods, and medical supplies. The sound first started small, but Glen being on edge was quick to be in her listen first, act, and then 'see what happened afterwards' mind set.

She'd been grabbing medical supplies, basically snatching anything she saw and tossing it into her bag. Gause, pill bottles, pain reliever, medication, and whatever those tubes were for. Doug was on food duty.

It was such a time that this paranoia saved her life.

Because as soon as Glen grabbed the last bottle of Ibuprofen off the shelf, stuffed it deep into her bag, and turned: she was greeted by two Walkers at the end of the aisle. They didn't see her first, which gave her the precious moments to get herself running. It was a surreal experience. Being this close to dead and seeing their skin festering and falling off. She almost dropped her bag that was thrown over her shoulder in pure shock. Instead, already having heard a few of their footsteps and labored exotic sounds; Glen ran.

She ran hard.

"Doug!"

He'd been down the party aisle last she'd seen.

She was super thankful that as soon as he heard her yell, followed it as she ran by them and then they both doubled back to leave the building. The Walkers moaning behind them in a chorus of hell.

It had been a close one.

* * *

Running from the local 'Mart, it didn't take long for the Geeks to all show their ugly faces. After being found by two walkers, three soon followed, then five, then twelve, until there were more than was possible to escape. They came from alleys and doorways and windows. Streaming into the street like worms from mud. And unfortunately enough, Doug and Glen had started running in the opposite direction from where their truck was.

It was an 'oh crap' moment when they reached the middle of town to be greeted with a line of Walkers. Basically trapped between two sides of undead-bastards.

Thankfully, before they could start to really panic, they weren't stuck for long. Glen was fast thinking and even faster on her feet. Seeing an alleyway that was deserted she turned down it, hoping beyond hope that there would be an escape. Doug had then pointed out the fire escape attached to an old apartment building. The only problem was that it was too high off the ground for them to successfully get on.

But there was a dumpster close enough that one could possible - maybe - jump from dumpster to ladder.

Of course, Glen had only ever seen such moves off of TV and video games. Crazy or desperate people did these moves. And... Well. Glen now qualified as both of those. Already half-way to hero-ville, Glen decided the split-second as she ran down the alley that it was either now or never.

And Glen was always a now or never kind of girl.

"What are we-" Glen did not decrease her speed even as Doug stuttered next to her.

Glen took a running leap onto the side of the dumpster and hauled herself up with a swiftness that should have surprised her. Half way up the dumpster, Doug's face the picture of confusion as he slid to a stop to watch dumbfounded while Glen took half a second to breath-

Then leapt.

A split second in air and Glen started questioning why the hell she would ever do such a thing. And why should thought it was even a possibility. And why, why, why-

Glen had never had a second last as long as it did while in air from dumpster to ladder. Not even that time in seventh grade when that douche Noah had rebuffed her affections and the entire school yard had shunned her. Not ever. Until the rail-ladder basically collapsed one of her lungs as she hit it straight on. An 'oomph' leaving her mouth as she grappled to gain a hold. The feeling of getting hit by a car and also sliding off a cliff hit Glen all at once, but somehow - God knew how - she pulled herself up.

She felt a moment of pure elation and joy as she pulled off a move that... well, really was impressive for her. Having been a delivery girl for a Pizza place down the street from her apartment, Glen didn't do muscle or action. Plus she lived off of video games, too. She didn't **do **real life drama.

It hit her: She just had.

Before the world could come off focus and become kilter-skewed by her adrenaline - she remember Doug.

A thrill of fear ran up her spine as she turned to see Doug staring dumbly up at her. Glen thrust her arm out frantically to Doug who was feet below her. Oh god. The dead were stumbling towards the fifteen year old at a stagger pace, slow enough that they had time but fast enough that it was barely enough. Slow but steady. When the Stumblers were at about seven feet away, Glen was able to gain purchase on Doug's wrist and with a grunt start to pull him up.

Glen was not a large woman. Nor was she tall. She was a small thing - built, honestly, for speed and stealth now that she knew what you needed for such things. So getting Doug from the ground to the top of the ladder, or even the bottom rung, was hard. Like one of those 'impossible tasks in video games' hard.

But somehow, with the zombies grappling for Doug's sneakers and him being pulled down and then back up like a tug-of-war; Glen did it. Perhaps it was the fear of being alone that forced her hand to do that impossible. Maybe she just liked giving the finger to fate. Could it have been the adrenaline coursing through her body?

It didn't particularly matter as Doug lay in front of her, sprawled against the mesh floor breathing hard through his gaping mouth. Glen was just proud he hadn't become zombie chow.

"Holy shit," Doug stated, dazed as the dead tried to raise themselves up the ladder, too. Limbs flailing uselessly at the bottom rung. The rotting muscles and tendons didn't help and they all failed, one by one to reach the meat above them.

Glen grunted, never being much for words as she leaned against the wall, catching her breath. The world had ended and it basically equated to her having to be less of a socially awkward penguin with people. Her arms hurt like a bitch, though. Like a sunburn and being whipped repeatedly. And tired. Fatigued really.

Hoping she wasn't going to have to do that again anytime soon, Glen allowed herself to breath briefly. One death-defying stunt was enough for the month.

"That was something out of an action movie." The admiration was easy to hear in Doug's voice, but Glen pushed it away like many small 'pleasures' nowadays.

Glen almost chuckled, but the sounds of the dead were becoming more unbearable. And louder, meaning that within the next half an hour the rest of the town walkers would be swarming the building. Because of sound alone.

If her whole body didn't hurt, Glen probably would have been more aware of what was going on around them. Like a good survivor did.

"We might have a problem."

But she wasn't paying attention.

"What problem?" Glen asked, looking to see Doug's mouth dropped open as he stared straight upwards through the mesh of the fire escape.

It was then that Glen saw for herself what exactly was happening.

Sometime between the end of the world and now, a bomb must have exploded from the side of the building. Perhaps a gas leak. Perhaps fate giving the finger right back at her.

Because half of the fire escape leading up onto the top of the building was completely gone.

With it, their safety.

* * *

By some miracle or gift from God - there were no walking dead in the small room that had exploded. It had been a small little apartment. It's kitchen and living room one, separated by only a counter top. Though there had been people in it originally, it was clear they would not be bothering them. Measuring the amount of gore on the walls, Glen surmised there had probably been three people. They had probably died from the blast, but not counting on it - Glen kept her eyes peeled.

One run in with a swarm of Geeks was enough for Glen.

Going through the cabinets she found a few boxes of cereal, canned goods, and a spice rack. _Two out of three wasn't bad,_ she decided as she started tearing the boxes apart so she could just grab the bags within.

Doug, having more luck with checking out the small apartment called out quietly, "I can't - Hey, come check this out!"

He was over by a large cabinet, staring curiously into a hole blown in the side. It was a pretty old looking thing, torn almost in half. Glen took another good look around, dropped the bags, and then went over to where Glen was kneeling.

"What is-" Glen began as she stopped by Doug's kneeling form. "Holy shit."

In the cabinet, or what was left of the cabinet, were guns.

And not small, portable guns, either. There was an assortment of rifles and shotguns, with ammo out the wazzu. It was enough that Glen was practically speechless. There was enough here for at least two people, with enough ammo to take out the Walkers in Atlanta.

_How hadn't anybody found this?_ Was Glen's first thought, follow immediately by: _Who cares?_

They spent the next half an hour going through the guns and packing away ammo in gun-bags they had found conveniently at the bottom of the cabinet. Thankfully Doug was a big enough kid, lanky more than muscular, that he could carry two bags, plus his backpack. Meaning that they could get away with more guns than they had thought were even left in the world.

And ammo.

Glen felt like crying as she sat against the wall, forgetting momentarily that they were trapped. They hadn't had this much good luck since they'd found each other. A part of Glen felt intensely suspicious, but threw that side of her away as she basked in the good fortunate they were now enjoying. Even surrounded by all the danger as they were.

"Poor things." Doug stated as he stared at the splatters on the walls. His eyes were glued to the remains as he tugged on his sleeve nervously. Who knew if touching the fluid would get you infected?

"Better them than us." Glen sighed, hoisting her bags up. Ignoring the dead-fluid on the walls in favor of keeping her eyes and ears peeled. "And besides, they left us with a small gold mine-"

The moment was cut short as a door creaked open somewhere. The echo made it almost impossible to pinpoint where the sound had originated from, but the fact that the sound had existed at all made Glen stop entirely.

Glen and Doug froze with the bags over their shoulders and backpacks tightly strapped on. Doug had his rifle close at hand, but didn't dare move. The pistol Glen had all but forgotten about was somewhere in her pant's elastic. Focusing on the feeling she felt it on her right side, right above her hip bone. They barely breathed as they waited for the next sound to come which would determine what they would be doing.

They expected a Walker. At least one, if not more.

What they got instead was a red-neck man, cross bow drawn as he whirled through the door in a formation that was almost militant in nature. His feet were swift as he kicked the door shut behind him all in the same motion before he saw them and leveled his weapon towards them.

It had happened so fast that Doug and Glen hadn't even had their hands on their own weapons themselves before the man had got them in his sights.

"Don't even think 'bout it."

Glen froze, hearing for the first time the gravelly voice coming from the man in front of her. Doug, being a hot-headed kid wasn't as quick to stop moving. An arrow buried itself in the wall between Glen and Doug's head, and before Glen could even slow her beating heart the red-neck had another slotted in its place. Doug's face was the picture of fear, sweating profusely and eyes wide with whites showing, as his hand fell away from his gun.

"I said," The man continued on without even a rise in his voice. "Don't even think 'bout it."

Seeing Doug look so shaken, she knew she had to stop the random stranger before he did any more damage. Glen was not prepared for human interaction of the violent kind, excluding the walkers, so she tried her best with what she was given.

"Alright. Alright." Glen tried, moving her hands from her hips. "Listen, we don't want any trouble."

The crossbow was suddenly pointed in Glen's direction and she froze. "The hell you don't, _chink_."

White hot fury that Glen had almost thought she was incapable of feeling warmed in her gut.

_The hell did this hillbilly know?_ Her family was new to the country by only **two **generations. They were citizens of the united states as much, if not more, than this idiot. She'd already had to live with her skin color and family heritage in high school and what little college she had gone through. She didn't need it at the end of the world.

"I'm _**Korean**_." Glen found herself snarling in anger, standing up as she did. "So,_ fuck you_ very much. And don't even get me started on how derogator-"

A snarl came from her left. She'd been so caught up in the man in front of her, that listening and being paranoid had momentarily escaped her.

At that same moment an arrow went flying.

* * *

Things were pretty tense after that.

The snarl had come from a Walker from the next room. A hole in the wall really. And they streamed through like a line of ants.

There ended up being four walkers in the room that afterwards was found to be the bathroom. All in various states of rot and falling apart. Two of them had been quickly dispatched by their attacker, and Glen had grabbed her own weapon to shoot the closest one. Doug followed, somewhat shakily.

Then, as soon as the walkers were dead and unmoving, for good, Glen and Doug whirled to point their weapons at the strangers face. With their guns already drawn, it was a little easier to level the playing field with the crossbow wielding hillbilly.

The fact that there had been another Walker behind them didn't help their case much, though. In fact, it probably weighed it down.

The hillbilly red-neck, after shooting the dead through his eyeball in a surprising display of skill; had cursed, looked them over, cursed again, and then introduced himself somewhat tensely as Daryl.

Nothing more. Nothing less. Glen was the second to lower her weapon, and Doug shakily followed.

It was clear the man didn't trust either of them, but Glen attributed that to the fact that they outnumbered him and had pointed guns at each other. They had followed with their names as well, giving just as good as they got. The fact that Glen had been called a 'chink' still pissed her off, but she usually let by-gones be by-gones.

"What the hell are you two even doin' here in Conyer?" Daryl asked as he flung his crossbow to his back. Even without his weapon on his front, he was plenty dangerous. Something told Glen that. Perhaps it was the fact that the wife-beater left little to the imagination and his muscles stood out lean and _there_. He had the body of what Glen would assume a lion wrestler must have needed.

Glen faintly thought to herself, _Conyer is the town's name? Damn, We're closer to Atlanta than I originally thought._ The sign had only posted of population, the name covered in graffiti. If she had known it was only a few miles to Atlanta she never would have stopped.

Death by starvation or not.

"Supplies." Doug grunted before Glen could give a more suitable response. Looking between the narrowed eyes of her two companions she quietly understood what was happening. _Oh no,_ She was not going to be dealing with a male-pissing match. Wasn't gonna happen. _Not today,_ her mind snarled.

Daryl was apparently on the same wave-length because he barely gave Doug a second glance as he looked to her. It was clear that she was the leader of their twosome. "Did the line of cars comin' out of the city not warn ya?"

Fed up with the day and its crappy-ness, Glen snapped back, "Didn't they warn you?"

There was an almost smile pulling at the corners of Daryl's scowling lips. "Touché."

Then silence. Which made it a lot easier for Glen to get a good look at their 'savior'. He was a tall guy, all wiry muscle and scruffy. He looked as if he hadn't bathed long before the dead had started rising. But he had a kind of... charm. If one were to ask Glen what she thought it was, she wouldn't be able to put it into words.

One thought stood out.

"Which way are you going?"

Daryl was immediately distrustful. His hand twitching as if to go towards his cross-bow on his back. "Why?"

"Better three than two." Glen felt she needed to at least try. Dangerous as the man was... he was human. And as far as Glen was concerned, that made him A-OK in her book. Perhaps not trustworthy yet, but... he wasn't dead. Racist but not dead.

Daryl followed her thought process and whipped his head towards her. His eyes wide in disbelief. "Like hell it is."

"When the dead outnumber you ten to one?" Glen posed, watching the man close up slowly. "I think another person evens the odds a little, don't you?"

Daryl was silent, his neck tense and his tendons standing out starkly. Glen almost thought he was going to hiss and stalk away to hid under a couch.

"Fine." He spat, looking towards Doug carefully. "But - Just till we get outt'a the city."

* * *

After that... it was pretty cut and dry.

Walkers had been swarming the lower levels, making it impossible to get out of the building without sacrificing someone. Daryl offered up Doug, which didn't win him any prizes, but other than that: they had no options except to go up.

Which, yes, was a death sentence.

Which made it even worse when a swarm of about ten Walkers chased them up the stairs. Cemented their decision. The walkers in the building were also better preserved and could almost jog after them. Barely giving them enough time to shut and lock the door before they fell upon the strong piece of steel. The groans and moans of their wanton brains asking for meat.

And that was how they managed to get caught up on a roof with no way to get down and only each other for company. The walkers were surrounding the building and none of the adjacent rooftops were close enough to get to. The rooftop they were on was bare of any useful material sans what they brought themselves.

"Fucking great." Daryl snarled, stomping over to the opposite side of the roof. Making Doug skitter closer to Glen.

"It could be worse." Glen tried to lighten the mood. Only succeeding in getting Daryl's eyes harshly on her. "One of us could have gotten bitten."

There was a moment of silence and then the redneck started cursing up a storm again.

Doug looked at her thankfully, but weakly. Glen guessed the days activities had worn him out.

Glen had to agree, even as she looked at the newest member of their rag-tag group.

At least one of them hadn't died.

* * *

Enjoy? Please review!  
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	2. A Little Thing Called Death

Sorry for the long break between chapters. I have no clue when I will write. Just not really feeling up to it this month :/

Enjoy tho!

* * *

**_A Lttle Thing Called Death_**

* * *

"I'm not going to be the bait." Doug said, looking between Glen and Daryl with something akin to indignity. The redhead was sweating like a dog in the sun more than either Daryl or Glen thought anyone was capable of. And Glen knew her aunt Karen.

"Glen, tell him I'm not going to be the-" It was halfway between pleading and whimpering. Glen was tempted to go along with Daryl because this was the most pathetic Doug had ever been in front of her. He was like a kicked puppy.

But Glen had to be the adult in this relationship. Rolling her eyes, she protected Doug. "You're not going to be the bait, Doug."

Daryl protested almost immediately. "He's the logical choice, china-woman!"

Ignoring Daryl's affinity for being a racist as well as sexisit, was hard but Glen managed.

"What is logical about a sixteen year old drawing the Geeks away?" Glen demanded, crossed arms in a fashion so similar to her mother she quickly tossed her arms away from herself in disdain. "Let's just - Let's think about this-"

"What's to think about?" Daryl stated, flatly. "You're useful, he's not. You wanna die because of sum stupid loyalty issue? Cause I don't. So, we gotta choose."

_Gahh! _Glen internally screamed. _So flippin' infuriating. _

Every plan he had come up with had involved sending Doug out on some suicide mission. Either by drawing the zombies off through way of his running through the town, or by cutting himself and sitting behind a closed door, and even - Glen shivered at this - just trying to jump across the huge divide between buildings and "hope for the best".

Whatever reason, Daryl made it his personal mission to make life hell for Doug. She had to guess it was because he had red hair, but that still didn't account for anything. He hadn't offered her up for bait. Which confused the ever loving shit out of Glen. They'd only known each other for half a day.

If that. And the man was already picking sides.

Plus the redneck would be leaving after they'd safely made it out of the city. Doug alive or dead shouldn't have any weight on the situation. It pissed Glen off to no end to know that Daryl wasn't just going to drop it, either. He was like a pitbull with a steak, stubborn and pig-headed. Daryl should have dropped it awhile ago, but probably enjoyed getting a rise out of the younger kid.

Doug did proceed to flush and look at Glen anxiously whenever it came to a suicide mission, so Glen had to give Daryl points for being a consideratly accurate douche-bag.

On the not so bright side - Glen was still exhausted. Probably because she had only slept four hours. It was a normal number of hours for her now since the world ended, but it still took its toll. With the bottom floors being overrun with Walkers it was unsurprising that they had ended up sleeping on the roof. Daryl had stayed up on watch for the first four hours - most likely not trusting them - and she had taken the last part of the night when the redneck had roughly shaken her and demanded that she "pull her weight". She chose to stay awake until the morning and let Doug sleep.

Which she got chewed out for in the morning by Doug himself. Great. She did not particularly care his opinion on the matter. He was a teenage boy. He didn't get an opinion unless it was life or death. Especially when Doug had awoken, he had looked even worse for wear that the previous day. Which worried Glen like no other.

Doug was the only one she had left. It was worth a little bit of suffering to see him well, if not happy.

Daryl only watched their interaction from the edge of the rooftop, keeping his distance even as they all ate a little bit of breakfast. Because of the awkwardness of their newest person present; they ate in silence, occasionally checking each other out. The fact that Daryl had a gun didn't sit well with Doug. Glen didn't really mind it, but could understand the kid.

Glen didn't blame him because Daryl hadn't stopped threatening him. Which made it easy to look over at him and see just how bad he was doing.

Doug didn't look so hot after they had finished their meager portions, but he and Glen had not had anything to drink for a while now. Their last bottle of water had gone dry yesterday. And the fact that they hadn't found anything to drink in town also made it that much worse. Glen had read about dehydration killing people, but she also knew that if they became really desperate - she knew of a stream close by.

She would drink from the disgusting pond water only if it was necessary and she was desperate. Like... Dying desperate.

Daryl was silent. He didn't talk much. Glen actually had only heard a few words from him and they consisted of his name, the fact that he was only staying with them for safety, and to bark low-commanding orders at them. Or argue about their next plan of action. When the first few times she had tried to start a conversation had garnered no response other than a few grunts or blank stares, Glen had given up trying to talk to him about the 'real' world.

Which was why after they'd eaten, it had been to a surprising array of non-stop bickering over how they were going to get off the roof. Glen had given her two-cents the first few times, but it was clear that this was somehow turning into 'man' territory. As if the two boys needed to preserve their testosterone in a world literally filled with violence and death.

Which led to Glen only shooting down the most absurd of the two's ideas.

And there were a lot. Mostly dealing with the suicide missions, but quite a few dealing with unethical things. _Really _unethical things. Which Glen refused to even name.

The world had only just ended. Give her time. She had time to lose her mind.

"I don't see why not." Daryl grumbled, stretching away from the sunlight that was starting to appear over the horizon. Stuck on the fact that he couldn't send Doug out to die. "Not like he's gonna survive long."

Oh for the love of-

"What part of three is better than two, didn't you get?" Glen sighed, rubbing her temples. She still had not had anything to drink for the past twelve or so hours. Being on the roof did not help that at all, either. Sunshine plus dehydration makes for a pissed of _anybody_.

"Tha part where we keep the li'ability?"

"You're not even _technically _part of our group," Glen claimed with a snarl. "You said so yourself. You're leaving once we get out of town. So why should I get rid of the only person in my group?"

Daryl raised his eyebrow as she ranted. "Don't make him any less useless."

It was enough to make Glen throw her hands in the air and stomp away. A few feet to the other end of the roof.

Glen rose to Doug's defense as she turned back around, composing herself.. "He's not useless,"

"Oh ya?" Daryl questioned, throwing out his hand to the now speechless Doug. "Tell me one thing tha ginger's good at."

What was with the red-neck and derogatory terms? It was like he couldn't live without breathing one out.

"His name is Doug, not 'the ginger' kid. And he does plenty."

Except you know... hunting, laundry, coordination, or any real intelligence. Alright so yeah, Doug was useless, but he was a kid. He was useless on principle. It was kind of like a baby... it had the potential to be great. Not just pop out of the womb that way.

"We're together til we get out of the city, Daryl," Glen declared. "We can figure out a way to get down without-"

Just as tension was rising and Glen was sure Daryle was about to cut a bitch: An alarm went off.

Everyone froze. Not tag-freeze freezing, but immobile, breathing stopped and eyes wide and staring.

The sound was like both a shriek of a harpy and a call for joy. Angels singing as they drowned. Hope and ridiculousness all wrapped in one package.

Everyone on the rooftop tensed and listened in disbelief as the car alarm sounded with a rhythm that had almost been lost in this pre-modern world, somewhere in the distance like a danger call. One at first, then two. Had cars been bumped or something? Were there others around? Had the alarm been a delay from before?

None of that mattered as the Geeks became aware of the sound. Hyper-aware.

The Walkers heard it, all of them perking up, starting up a groan straight from hell and stumbled-walked towards the sound. In one wave, all of the Geeks who had been around them left. Following the lead to something much more interesting than a day old smell of fresh meat and pounding hearts.

Somewhere in Glen's confused mind she knew this was it. Now or never. Her feet were frozen to the floor. Her heart was pounding. And her symptoms of the apocalypse were rip-rearing and ready to go. But she found the strength, the sheer-stubborn-ass born from surviving and killing the undead to speak into the roof-top.

She whispered. "We gotta go."

Since she was facing away from the wind, it got caught up into the breeze, but it was clear the other's heard her.

Nobody moved. Daryl out of cautiousness and Doug because Doug was Doug. Deer in the headlights and everything. Hand holding his gun too tight, and shaking.

They didn't have time for Doug to be a child, nor for caution. "Now!"

In a second, the boys were finally following her words. Bags thrown over shoulders, weapons held at the read, and prepared. They had not unpacked anything, because that would have just been plain stupid. So it was just divvying up who was going to carry what. Which was not hard because they already had their packs. Except they shared with Daryl the extra bag of guns.

The look Daryl had given Glen as she pushed the extra bag into his hands was almost priceless, and she wished her camera still had battery to capture the moment.

And yes. That took a lot of faith that he was not just going to up and run away, but at this point - it was not going to hurt them any. A few guns they could spare. No problem compared to a person who could quasi-protect them.

They had their bags across their backs and standing near the door in seconds. As Glen repositioned a shoulder strap, she listened intently for sounds on the other side of the door. It was silent, but that did not mean they were clear. Geeks occasionally fell into a coma like silence, and stood in corners to mope about their stupid lives.

Daryl had never been Military as far as Glen could tell. His steps spoke of discipline, but his eyes spoke of flightiness. He was much too wild and untamed to ever have survived in the United States Armed Forces. Which was both a blessing and a curse. Because Daryl was capable. He knew his way around a gun and a hunt.

But he was also bat-shit crazy and unpredictable.

And that may or may not have had any weight to why Glen was ultimately unsurprised that Daryl threw open the door and went first down into the maw of darkness and flickering bulbs kept going from a generator too stupid to understand the end of the world. Glen followed next and, for some reason, Doug hobbled behind. Glen, worried shot him a concerned look but he smiled reassuringly.

"I just twisted my ankle, G. Didn't notice till today." It was almost accepted that use of nicknames meant nothing was serious. "Just shot a Geek, G," and "Don't worry so much, G." Made the world a little bit of a better place. Adrenaline could work wonders for escape plans.

Glen pushed that thought out of her mind as she turned on all her survival-symptoms. Allowed them to come to the forefront of her body.

Just as they had predicted of the Walkers, the place was zombie free. Not a one had stayed behind. It was not the first time that Glen was happy that the Walkers were dumber than a flock of pigeons, all vying for the next shiny toy to come around. But it was the first time she was grateful that someone else was going to get the brunt of the beasts attention.

Getting out into the open air of the town was always a scary moment. The first step from the semi-safety of a building to open ground was... well, terrifying. It was desperation that lead to leaving the safety of a building, and it was all or nothing. It grabbed Glen's heart as they peered out of the doors and un-smashed windows. It said something that even Daryl hesitated on the way out.

Then again, as long as Glen had known and watched Daryl she could honestly admit that he was not stupid in any shape or form.

Except from what the SAT might require.

As soon as they were outside, it was running. Non-stop if they could. As far and as fast in the opposite direction from the car alarm that was still blaring its sound to the world. Doug was considerably slower, but for some reason Daryl stuck it out. Jogging instead of all out running. And occasionally looking back at them.

Glen guessed it was because they were his literal backup. Watching his back as he watched the front, but she could not be sure. She was just glad that Daryl had kept his promise. Instead of running off at the first sign, he kept with them in the city.

Afterwards was a different matter.

"It's quiet." Daryl whispered as they stopped behind a car to catch their breath and make sure the coast was clear. They were almost to the outer edges of the highway. The beginning of the road block right in front of them. Glen could see the cars from where they had come from.

Home free had never sounded so good.

Glen heard the '_too quiet_' that Daryl wanted to voice. Glen didn't quite understand why Daryl hadn't spoke it. Too quiet was much better than 'just quiet enough'. She got that.

And then Glen understood.

The car alarms that had been beeping and blaring were now silent. And the world around them was mimicking it. The birds were silent, and there were no sounds except their breathing and beating hearts. The term ghost-town came to mind, but Glen threw it to the side. If there were ghosts, she wanted no part of that.

Walking dead were enough for one lifetime.

"We gotta move." Glen grunted rising to go around the car, only to be greeted by Daryl grabbing her by her wrist and pulling her back down. She landed against his chest with a huff, before ultimately trying to squirm away.

"No." He whispered, looking over her shoulder and the car, ignoring how she was trying to get away from him. "Look."

And Glen did, but she was also very, very aware of Daryl. And damn. She'd known that he had muscles, but being this close and feeling it was a very different story. He was as fit as a bear but slightly safer to be around. And the hunter-redneck definitely had abs. _That _Glen could feel for sure.

Tearing her mind away from how comfortable it really _should not_ have been to be against Daryl, she listened and watched to where Daryl pointed.

There was a Walker, stumbling around as if it did not even know what was going on. It seemed aggravated, but both Glen and Daryl could not tell why. Its actions were stiff, but much faster than any Walker had been before. And it's back was to them.

And it was breathing.

Doug was sitting against the side of the car, not even looking over the window. And he was shivering. Probably frightened. Glen ignored him, in favor of watching the erratic and strange Walker. A walker she had never seen the likes of before.

And then, the walker did something that made Glen freeze against Daryl's chest.

The thing... talked.

"-hit - fucking, -" Deep breathing almost close to tears. Far enough away that it seemed like it was just growls. "- can't... believe they -"

The Geek, now somehow not, stumbled and fell to the ground, groaning. Flesh was already falling off its body, but it still somehow kept most of its motor functions working.

"Someone," The thing cried pitifully and weakly, moaning into the ground. "Help."

And suddenly it was not a Walker to Glen. It was a person. Heart clenching, it was easy to feel for the poor thing.

They needed her help. She tried to climb off of Daryls chest, wanting to help the thing.

"Don't even think' o' it," Daryl growled, tightening his hold on her wrist. "Thing's dead."

Glen froze, realizing exactly where she was. Pressed this tightly against a man who had only hours ago been threatening them, then saving them.

"Dude, we can't just leave him," Glen hissed. "We have to help him!"

Daryl only held her tighter as if stopping her from doing the most utterly dumb thing ever. "Don't mean nothing."

"Maybe, but Glen," Doug agreed, looking over at the man in the center of the road as well. "He looks like he's on the verge of death."

"Probably was bit," Daryl confirmed, confusing both Glen and Doug.

Doug beat Glen to the punch. "What does being bit have to do with anything? Is it rabies?"

Glen felt Daryl tense behind her, as she finally was able to shimmy out of his limping hold to turn and look at him. Ignoring, for the moment, the small cries of the man dying in the street.

"Are ya both dumb?" Daryl asked with barely concealed shock. "You get bit - you turn into one of them things. Same as dying by 'em."

"That can't be," Glen gaped, blinking.

But it did.

Now that Glen thought about how an infection usually started, it all made sense. That made a lot more sense than just the dead rising because they could. She _had _taken medical school serious when she had been there. It had just been a very stressful month. She forgot things... She was allowed that.

Daryl looked both of them over before hitting his head against the car.

"Aww hell," Daryl groaned, clutching his bow to his side. "Don't tell me one of ya got bit and didn't tell me."

Before he could continue that thought and run off, Glen stopped him.

"No, we didn't," Glen snarled, turning back to the man in the street. He'd stopped moving as much and was now just kind of lying there. It broke her heart, watching a man die and being unable to do anything. Especially in the middle of a street, alone and broken.

Nobody deserved that.

Her resolve strengthened. Thinking quickly she made her choice. Before Daryl or Doug could think to grab her again she rose and walked out to the man in the street. As she got closer, ignoring the whispers of "get back here" and "ya dumb bitch, yer gonna get killed!" she noticed the smell first. It was like a latrine, mixed with death. Then she saw his face. Matted hair, and sunken eyes.

He looked dead and Walker-ified.

"Hey."

The man barely moved, but he turned his head to look at her. A fraction of an inch, but just enough to see her.

"Angels - are... asian?" He asked, his mouth gaping open. Drooling blood.

It was a disgusting sight. Blood was pooling from his mouth and nose onto the ground, and his eyes were wide and afraid. But also accepting. He knew he was going to die, and nothing Glen would be able to do would save him.

Good. Even footing it seemed.

"I'm not an angel." Glen answered quietly.

"Then - Who-who're... you?" The man slobbered, closing his eyes as if the fact that she wasn't an angel just put him off his lunch.

"Glen." She found herself whispering, even as she knelt next to the putrid man. His skin was boiling and pussing. Hair falling out and muscles spasming.

Glen found herself asking, "What's your name?"

It took the man a moment.

"Tom." He whispered, before coughing violently, not even trying to lessen the blows that it was doing to his lungs.

"Hi Tom." Glen noted, saying the dying man's name out loud to make it more real to her. "I'm just gonna sit here with you. That okay?"

Tom just barely nodded.

Glen sat next to him, pulling her knees up as she did. Fully paranoid still of the Walkers coming after her, but sitting as quietly next to the dying man as she could. It had been a while, but Glen did have her beliefs. And one of them, if she could help it, was going to be upheld.

Nobody deserved to die alone.

It was perhaps luck that no Walkers came while the man died. Or it was maybe more.

Glen managed to stay by the man's side, simply offering her comfort without any sort of touch or contact, for five minutes. It seemed like longer. Like forever. Daryl and Doug stayed behind the barrier of the car, guns and crossbow probably prepared to shoot either her or the Tom if it came down to it.

But Glen would survive the encounter.

Tom was not as lucky as she was. He had lost the ability to speak, whether it had been from his infection or loss of blood, and was now just kind of laying there. Eyes hooded, near death, but his heart still beat. For Glen, that was enough to stay close at hand, knees pulled up to her chin but there.

Glen wondered, for the next few sparse seconds what this man Tom had been like. Before all of this had happened. Had he been a politician? Married? A widow? A soldier? His clothes were plain enough, but Glen knew that meant little. This man had had a life, and now he was going to have a death. And it was going to be alone.

Even Glen could not stop that. She could stay with the body as it died, but Tom was already gone. She knew that. She just prefered to stay with him until his last breaths.

Not many other people were going to get this opportunity. Not many had died with any kind of dignity. If she could give that to one person...

It would be worth it.

When Tom stopped breathing entire, his whole body simply stopping its movement with a giant shuddering jolt; Glen knew it was time. There was no momentous occasion. One second he was in pain, dying - the next he wasn't. She stayed sitting next to him for another few seconds, before breathing deeply and rising.

The man Tom was now dead. In his place was a ticking time bomb. And no matter if Daryl's bite theory was true - this man had overstayed his welcome on this world.

Glen felt absolutely no remorse as she shot him once in the head. There was an empty pit in her heart that had opened up and swallowed any remorse she might have been able to garner. It was a more fitting end then him coming back as a Walker. That much Glen could assure. She'd done her best, and now she couldn't say she was going to feel sorry. Though there was a hollow feeling in her chest as the shot echoed around the buildings, reverberating into her frame.

"Let's go." She whispered to the boys as she shoved her backpack back onto her body and readied her gun. Daryl must have heard her, or else he was just much more attuned with her than she had thought. She looked behind simply to see if Doug was alright.

As she saw Doug, limping as he was, she was simply glad he was alive. That she could feel without weeping. He was alive. Not dead. At least, not anytime soon. Perhaps never. Not lying on the ground with a bullet in his brain. Not blubbering blood as he tried to say his last words. She hadn't had to repeat the procedure with him. Which made her heart exceedingly glad.

As Daryl walked by her, his face set in a thoughtful expression, Glen felt the need to apologise for endangering their lives; the only way she knew he would accept.

"I would have done that for you, too. Y'know." Glen apologized as she fixed her backpack.

Daryl was unimpressed. "What? Shoot me? I'm sure glad."

"No."

He grimaced at her, some kind of 'not understanding' in his eyes. But he wasn't an idiot, and he understood her meaning. "You don't even know me. Or him. Didja?"

"Doesn't matter." She smiled to herself weakly. "It's us or them. Us against the world. And whether you like it or not... You're one of us."

Daryl didn't respond.

"Group or not."

When the Walkers had gotten to where Glen had shot Tom: They were long gone.

It took an hour walking to get to the truck. The supplies were still there, and the truck had not been broken into. Which Glen took as a good sign and also a depressing signal. Were there not enough people around? Was it some moral obligation? They had a truck yes, but where were the people?

Doug's limp had gotten worse, but when asked about it; he waved Glen off like she was an annoying mother hen. Glen left him alone only for the fact that he didn't look all that bad. At least, not from the standpoint of him having a badly sprained ankle.

Daryl was a different matter.

Glen stood next to the truck before turning around, her bags still on her back, to Daryl. She wanted to say thanks and all that good stuff. Try and convince him to stay, but he was already ahead of her.

"Good luck." Daryl drawled before turned away to begin his trek into the woods.

"Whoa, wait!" Glen called out, completely shocked as the stranger that they still didn't know all that well, just walked off. She almost had expected him to try something more. Like steal from them.

"Where will you go?"

"I got places to be." He called back, not once looking from his path. Bag of extra guns over his shoulder. "And we're out'a the city. Ain't got no use for each other any more."

Within five minutes, he was gone over the forest line.

_So much for finding more survivors to hang out with_. Glen grumbled to herself, tossing the bags into the very back after unlocking the door. It was Daryls choice to leave and she always respected free-range choice. Glen just thought it was a very stupid choice to go off into the forest, armed with a crossbow and a bag of guns. Alone.

"Forget him," Doug spoke for the first time in almost a half an hour. "He's just trying to survive like us, I guess."

Glen looked over from the drivers side to see Doug leaning heavily against the trucks passenger side door, already in the truck. She'd been pretty caught up in her own pity party that she'd forgotten about Doug's ankle.

"How's the sprain?" She asked, with no-small amount of compassion.

Doug shifted, wincing. "I donno."

She raised an eyebrow as she gathered herself up into the cab. As she started the truck up, she questioned, "How can you not know?"

"I just don't." Doug stubbornly refused to look at her, head against the cool glass of the window.

Entirely unsatisfied with the answer, but knowing that they'd been through alot; Glen backed up the truck to turn it around and drove away from the city. If Doug didn't want to talk about it, it really wasn't her business to pry.

But watching the rearview mirror as they left the city was bittersweet. There had been hundreds of dead walking. And yet...

There were still some people left.

Daryl proved it.

Perhaps he was smarter staying away from crowds, like Glen was looking for.

When they made camp about an hour later. A long ways away from the city in a cornfield, Glen finally sat down with Doug. To try and help him with his ankle that he was still complaining about. He'd done so the entire car ride.

Only, he hadn't wanted her help.

"I'm fine!" Doug repeated for the tenth time. "Just... leave it alone, okay? It's going to heal. "

"Doug," Glen tried, placatingly. Way beyond tired. "Just let me see your _damn _leg before I beat you. Kay?."

Stubbornly, he held out like a petulant child. "No."

"I can't help you if you don't let me, Doug." Glen growled, throwing her hands in the air.

"I'm fine." He insisted, but Glen could see he wasn't. She'd seen how he had deteriorated during the car ride.

Doug had slowly gotten a sallow and pale look to his face, the longer they drove. At first, Glen had suspected his leg, but now that it was starting to affect his temperature and his appetite; she knew it wasn't. It could be some kind of flu, and if Doug didn't let her check him out; he could die. He would leave her. There were no hospitals left to help. Without the right medication, Glen couldn't do anything for him.

What confused her was why he wasn't letting her help him.

He knew these truths just as well as she did. If he died, she would be alone. So why he was being stubborn over a life-or-death, simple decision, Glen hadn't a clue.

Glen decided that being firm and no-nonsense was the only way to get him to open up.

"I just want to help. I can't help if you -"

Apparently Doug couldn't stand it anymore, because he broke into tears. Shocking Glen into dropping the gauze she had been holding.

"Okay! Okay!" She soothed, taking a step back. "I'm sorry, alright? You can take care of your leg-"

She hadn't thought she'd pushed him that hard. Maybe the Walkers had really messed with his psyche? Had he had any nightmares? She didn't remember him tossing and turning at all...

"I can't!"

Blinking in confusion, she had to ask, "What do you mean? You said it was just-"

"I just- What Daryl said about the bites- and-and- how-" Whatever he was saying was lost in his sobs.

What he had said gripped Glen tightly around the heart. Bite? What bite? Glen had been with him the entire time. She would have known had he gotten bitten. Doug didn't even have a spot of blood on him. Maybe he was just worried he was going to get bit?

That must have been it.

"Doug-" Glen tried, coming a little closer, hoping to comfort him. "If you're scared you can-"

And he dropped the bombshell.

"Just - Stop!" Doug sniffled. "I've been bit - okay! Fucking munched on!"

The silence, save for the crackling of the fire filled the clearing, and Dougs sobs started back up. He then fumbled with his pant leg, the leg he had been favoring, and ripped the leg of the pants up. Revealing a large wound that was simply bleeding. There was no healing around the affected area, and the steady trickle of blood must have been the cause of his paleness.

Glen could not doubt the authenticity of such a statement.

"You got bit?"

Doug was bit.

Doug didn't speak, he just nodded. Face turned away from her and eyes scrunched up in some kind of tortured expression.

"When?" Glen asked, frozen to her spot.

She tried to calculate when they had last been in close quarters with a walker. They had gotten onto the roof in time, nothing had gotten close enough... Where the hell had he got bit? Glen worried over if they both had somehow got bit.

"When?" Doug parroted, as if confused by the question. "... In-in the alley."

Glen couldn't form words. It was as if every word she had ever learned was useless. Nothing would help.

Doug was **bit**.

"When you.. you know, did that leap onto the ladder and pulled me up." Doug continued, explaining. "One of... one of the Geeks got me. I thought - I had just scratched myself at first, because it didn't hurt all that bad. Kind of like a pinch - But... after we got caught on the roof..."

Glen imagined the next words because Doug stopped. _"I figured it out."_

**Doug was bit.**

What was Glen to do with this information? How did she handle it?

She had never had anyone close to her die in front of her. Sure she had stayed with the Tom guy, but she didn't know shit about him. Her grandmother had died in a nursing home, away from the world. Her parents could still be alive, but she had no clue. They hadn't talked for almost two years. Her friends had just disappeared and Glen herself hadn't waited around once people started chomping faces. Cowardly as it was. It was everyone for themselves.

_Doug was bit._

What did one say to that? Scream? Shout? Cry back at him? Argue? Promise that he was going to be okay? Lie through her teeth to save face?

What did someone say to a deadman?

"I'm sorry." Glen sniffled, instead of all those other things. A hand had found its way to her mouth, stifling any sounds she might make involuntarily. She found it exceedingly hard to keep the cotton-mouthed feeling from her throat as she sat next to Doug, head in her hands. "I'm so sorry."

Because what could she say? Can't believe you went and got yourself bit? Sorry I couldn't protect you more? Do you want me to shoot you now?

...Or later?

Glen couldn't even think after that last thought. Doug had then thrown himself at her. And she hugged him to her as he cried into her shirt, wondering what this meant for everything. She could only pat him on the back, and try to lessen the weight of the world on his shoulders.

All their plans were null and void now. Glen acknowledged darkly. Finding others was now on hold. Doug's life was ending, and with it all of his promises and dreams. Glen would survive for the simple fact that she just couldn't stop living.

All because of one universal truth:

Doug was bit.

* * *

Any thoughts? ^.^ All are appreciated!


	3. Away we Go

Well it had been a long time, now hasn't it?

No apologies I can really give, I just don't have a lot to write :/

Still working through some stuff and I write to get through stress. This week had a WHOLE lot of stress, soooo perhaps next week, huh?

ENJOY!

* * *

**Away we Go**

* * *

It had been a beautiful day in Augusta, Georgia. The sun had been up high in the sky, but the warmth of the air hadn't been stifling. There had been a breeze, which brought the smell of spring into the four corners of the world.

At least Glen's world.

It was her day off from '**Hell's Pizza Place**'. She had been taking it easy. Waking up at eleven and then going for a run to keep herself fit and, as her friend Becca would have said, "sexy and ready". What Glen would be ready for, she had never quite found out. But she could guess. Becca had a one-track mind focused almost totally on finding a rich guy.

Becca was not the most obtuse companion or friend.

And as Glen had been running, it had been a silent day. Beautiful but silent. Even the birds, which were almost always obnoxious with their song, had stayed without their voices. Glen hadn't noticed at first, on account of the fact she had her headphones in, an ipod and its container around her arm, and a rhythm set deep into her heart as she ran.

But even Glen couldn't ignore when some slimeball actually had the _audacity _to try and have a go for her in broad daylight. In the middle of a **park**, nonetheless. There were _children _around. It had broken her stride as the grimy arm had come out of nowhere and grappled for her. Shocked her out of her comfortable stride and the song that had been playing an upbeat rhythm. She had been thinking of her grocery list when the limb had thrown her off.

But Glen was used to these things. Being a fairly attractive woman, she knew the dangers of simply being born a woman and asian. Never in broad-daylight but in alleys at night. Nightclubs. The shady places. Men were perverts so she kept running, only looking back when she had gotten far enough away. A few meters or so.

"Hey!" She called out as she turned around, nose crinkling in distaste as she popped her ear-buds out to give him one-for. "What gives? You think you can ju-"

Her words caught in her throat as the man stumbled towards her, slowly. Still several feet away. His arms seemed too long as he moaned at her. Eyes yellow and sickly sticking out of his face without seeing. He didn't seem drunk, but he definitely had an air of drunkenness about him. He stumbled but didn't fall.

Glen would have gone to help him, had he seemed like he was worth saving. A wolf with Rabies looked saner than the man in front of her. Healthier, even.

His entire being screamed "_**off**_" to Glen. Like when one was in a hospital and looking at cancer children. _Wrong-wrong-wrong_. She found whatever protest she had had drowned by a voice in her head saying: "Run."

It was the voice that had been in her head thousands of times before. Don't drink that. Don't be a fool. Don't. Her cautionary words in her mind turning into a kind of guardian angel that she had never really thought to cast any suspicion towards.

So, she listened and ran. Turned and didn't even bother putting the earbuds back into her ears.

It was easier to see now. Watching Doug... Since that day, with her first encounter with a Walker; Glen had been running.

Since the first time she had seen someone, stupidly try and help a Walker get chomped into bits. Screaming until they couldn't anymore.

Since... was it really already four weeks?

Even now, she couldn't force herself to look backwards.

Maybe that could change though.

* * *

"It's not going to get better, is it?" Doug groaned as he leaned against the truck bed, twitching, t-shirt soaked. The sweat was a consistent part of his day. Almost non-stop. The newest addition to his flu like symptoms was the constant vomiting of blood. Thankfully away from her, over the truck bed's sides.

Glen didn't want to answer, but she knew it would be useless not to. Wiping away some of Doug's fevered sweat she spoke, "No, it's not Doug."

Doug tried to smile at her, but failed and ultimately puked over the side of the truck. Again.

The times between his coughing fits were getting less and less pronounced, and Glen knew it meant something important for his life. The end was coming. She could see it in his drooping eyes, his hot-hot skin, and his sluggish almost exhausted movements.

And Doug knew it, too.

"Is there anything I can do for you Doug?" Glen questioned, as the boys shivers increased.

"Shoot me?" Doug gurgled, pressing his head hard against the truck's bed railing. Hoping for some respit against the heat, but he had already laid his head there. It was luke-warm."Preferably in the head."

Glen held his hand. "You really want me to shoot you?"

He was silent for a few moments.

"No. I just-"

Then he sniffled and almost spoke before the coughing fit came back violently - again. Doug hadn't been able to keep anything down since eating on the roof with Daryl, what seemed like a lifetime ago...

It had only been fifteen hours since Doug had been bitten, by Glen's calculations, and he had degraded so quickly; Glen was surprised to look up and see the sun only just starting its descent. They hadn't left their spot in the clearing, the truck as safe as could be and the area around them easy to watch for Walkers if not terribly oepn. There wasn't any danger as far as she could see, so Glen stayed right where she was.

"I'm sorry, Doug-"

"Would you... - stop?" Doug snapped sluggishly. "Ishn't your fault."

Glen scoffed. She took responsibility for her actions. Always would. "Going into the city was my idea. Ergo, my fault."

"Not... your fault."Doug tried again, shivering and then coughing. This time the fit lasting much longer than a minute. When Doug finally was able to get his breath back, it was to moan out scratchily, "Damn..."

He breathed raggedly, trying to get out some kind of sentence while he coughed.

"Besides... I'm..." Half a minute for coughing. "Dead... in a... few anyway."

A few what? Minutes? Hours? Days? Was it bad Glen was praying for a few days, no matter his pain?

Glen vehemently denied that. "Don't say that."

"Glen," Doug whispered with more compassion that Glen would have thought a fifteen year old on the verge of dying could have. Not that she had met many of those. "I'm gon - na die... soon -"

Glen listened to what could be Doug's last words without breathing, not wanting to miss the basically-mouthed syllables. Doug being much too weak to raise his voice above anything more than a whisper.

"It's been... good run..." Doug mumbled, eyes fluttering shut in pure exhaustion. "Don't... regret..."

And Glen strained to hear anything else but Doug was out. Completely unconscious. Thing unsaid that she wished had been, but even Glen wasn't selfish enough that she would wake up Doug after he'd already fallen asleep. Safe from his coughing fits and perhaps his own death. There was nothing more to do. All she could do was gently pet the side of his face, greasy with grim and sweaty as it was.

Glen sat back against the trucks haul, head knocking into the glass of the cab as she let out a strangled sigh a mixture between grieving and denial. Doug shivering but silent beside her.

_How had the world come to this?_ Glen wondered, staring up at the cloudless, Georgia sky. Arms limp by her side as she listened to the world. Birds chirping, squirrels angry and squabbling, along with the sound of a stream close by. How had it gone so wrong so fast?

Just days ago she and Doug had been traveling Georgia, fighting for their lives, and simply trying to live; now it seemed as if that was only ever a **dream**. Surviving the apocalypse? Why had Glen thought it would be easy... Why had she thought there weren't going to be casualties close to her own heart?

Glen had been **arrogant**, she knew that, and now she was paying the price with blood. She'd never been much of a people person. Not family. Not friends. Put up with them if there was a mutual benefit but other than that she left them alone. They left her alone. She hadn't needed anyone, and nobody had really needed her.

She was fast on her feet, quick witted, and able to think fast in the face of most modern dangers. There were all things people apparently could put up with, even if she was anti-social. How were those skills supposed to help her now? Doug was _**dying **_and none of those attributes would save him. She couldn't outrun or outthink a sickness.

She couldn't. No matter how much she wanted to bend physics and stop time and space from continuing on. No matter how much it would hurt when he was gone.

"What am I supposed to do now?"Glen questioned as she listened to Doug's breathing. In and out, in and out. Weak but consistent. His body moved with his heart and he still lived. Even if he was not awake; it didn't mean he wasn't there. His heart fluttered weakly under her hand.

_But for how long? How long until his body succumbed to this virus? How long till he rose and tried to eat her?_

Glen hadn't a clue.

She'd never stuck around to watch those die and reanimate. That was a fool's errand. It didn't help that she could hear a noise in the distance. A rumbling roar of machine coming down the road. Smaller than her truck, but bigger than a lawnmower. Interrupting her.

She didn't need this right now.

Then again, who did?

* * *

Daryl. That was who had been coming down the road. The stranger, Daryl, cross-bow wielding, gun toting, all around american. Daryl no-last-name.

Riding on a Harley, somehow, muffling the engine. Perhaps it was built that way. Maybe he built it that way. Glen couldn't see how.

Glen had been leaning against her truck, watching the road for whoever would be coming around. Whether they be good or bad, she was going to face it head on. What did she have to lose? Herself?

She hardly seemed like a prize.

It had been an almost pleasant surprise when Daryl had pulled up, right next to the truck and swung his leg off, kicked the stand, never taking his eyes off her.

"You didn't make it far." Daryl observed, looking over the campground they had established. "Had at least half a days run."

Glen didn't move, "Not a whole lot of reason, too."

Daryl raised an eyebrow before stiffening, hearing Doug's groan for the first time. Glen had heard it so often, it didn't phase her, but she wasn't deaf. It sounded like a Walker. Even as weak as it had been. Even as human as he was at the moment. The undertone was clearly dead.

Before Daryl would do anything rash, Glen stopped him. "It's Doug."

Daryl fixed her with an intense stare. "Bit?"

"Yes."

Daryl didn't even blink. Nor did he berate her, or Doug. Perhaps even Daryl had enough of a heart to stay out of that.

"He's almost gone, I take it?" Daryl said, crossing his arms peering over the truck bed.

Glen didn't have to say anything. The fact that Doug was not coherent said all for her. She looked in, too, and was worried by what she saw. He'd slid down a little from his sitting position. His muscles limp. His breathing was slow, and she could count the intakes per minute on one hand.

"Gotta admit, didn't think this would be the next time I saw you." Daryl started, watching the sleeping kid.

Glen allowed a small, regrettable smile to her face. Exhaustion was seeping into her very bones. "Ditto."

Then Doug stopped groaning.

Not a dead stop, either, but it slowed until Glen couldn't hear his breathing. Which hadn't happened in hours. There'd always been the soft puffing he had made. Sick and dead as it had been.

It was a reflexive action, born from many years, that she gripped her long jacket sleeves in her fingers and pulled, tightening until she didn't have much blood flow left in her hands. She tried to keep her breathing steady, but it was hard. She had never had a panic attack, but now that the world had ended; it seemed as if everything was ending. Doing new things that she never thought she would do.

The world narrowed for her, as she stared at the unmoving form of Doug.

"He's dead - Ya'know?"

Hearing it spoke made the knowledge even worse, but somehow better. The words themselves were harsh, but truthful. Like a slap to the face.

She croaked. "I know."

Glen had her eyes closed, but could feel Daryl moving around her. She knew what he was going to do. She knew because it was the very thing she would do.

Doug was dead.

He was going to finish the job.

That thought was simply **unthinkable**. In her state of mind, he had just been alive. How had it just ended so soon? How fast did it take for someone's soul to leave them?

She grabbed the edge of Daryl's shirt, "No. Stop."

"He's already dead-" Daryl protested, quietly. His crossbow already in hand as he looked down at her with a frown.

"Doesn't mean you get to do it." Glen found herself saying, "I want to do it... I _need _to do it."

It surprise her when the words came out, but they strengthened her resolve.

"Ya sure?" Daryl questioned, some kind of newfound respect and pity in his eyes. "I ain't got no connect to him. It's easy fur me."

"I'm the only one left that will remember him after this..." It was only right.

"So yes."

And Daryl backed off, taking a step away from the truck almost politely. As if seeing the validity in the statement and honoring it.

Glen took a deep breath, before stepping forward the few paces to the back of the truck and hopping up. Doug lay as if he was only sleeping, eyes closed and head turned slightly towards the forest. His face was sunken, his skin falling, but his body hadn't changed. It had only stopped working.

He was dead, Glen realised, but that didn't mean she didn't still know him. His laugh whenever she would make a corny joke. The way he rolled his eyes when he didn't want to do something, but did it anyway. How they used to argue. His his lips would quirk when something hit him just right enough to be funny.

Glen realized, with a slap of stark clarity she hadn't seen in a while - she wasn't ready.

Dead was a part of life, but this seemed like a heinous crime. Too young, thats what Doug was. The gun was in her hand, and she could pull the trigger whenever she wanted. It was aimed at Doug's head.

But.

She didn't want to.

It wasn't a revelation, but it was a fact. It wasn't a need to kill him again, but refusal.

She stood for almost a minute, just looking him over. Taking all the time she could to study his face before she blew up. Him or herself, really. Time would tell which came first. She could count every freckle on his face if she wanted, note how the orange color of his hair was almost auburn, and understand from the pictures that yes, he did have his mother's nose.

But it wasn't enough.

Her eyes unfocused, and she wiped at them angry. Now was not the time to be weak. Tears streaked her long sleeved jacket taking away most of the moisture. A shock as she realized just how heavily she had been starting to leak.

Before she could really talk herself out of it, Doug twitched. It started in his hands, and then his arms. There was no rhyme or reason to the movements, just that it was capable of happening. It was slow, but Glen was mesmerized. And then, his head moved.

How long had she stood there? Shocked. Stock-still. World crumbling even as Doug moved when he should have stayed down.

Glen was shocked at just how quickly he had changed. It couldn't have been more than ten minutes since he had fallen asleep. Maybe two after he had died. The yellow of his eyes as he looked backwards at Glen struck her. And then Doug moaned, deep in his throat as he started to turn towards her. His movements baby like in their obscurity.

His body was stuttering at all the wrong times, and he ended up face down more times than Glen could count as he came closer. And even thought he looked wrong, Glen couldn't do it. She couldn't shoot him. Falling to her knees as he came closer, she realized she didn't know if she wanted to fight him either.

As Doug was reaching out to her, a moan halfway past his lips; his head exploded.

Glen flinched,and shut her eyes as some of the gore flew towards her, most of it passing her on the side. It was exactly like watching a watermelon explode, except the pieces of fruit were flesh, bone, and teeth. And after the fact, since she had been so close, she was drenched.

"You didn't move fast enough." Daryl was standing with one of the guns they'd taken from the blown up apartment across from her, still standing on the ground.

Glen breathed in the stench of Doug all over her. It was putrid and stank but Glen couldn't bring herself to wipe it away.

"I know."

"Wanted him to get you or somethin'?" Daryl asked, a spark of anger in his tone, as he lowered the gun and stared at her like she was crazy.

"No." Glen admitted. More to herself than Daryl. "Just... He was there. And I... couldn't do it."

He left her alone as she wiped the grime off her face, grimacing as it left behind streaks of human fluid. It hit Glen like a truck that having Doug all over her was just plain **wrong**. Her stomach tossed and turned.

It didn't take her long to rise to her feet, stomach roiling, and start to walk unsteadily towards the stream she could faintly hear crashing and banging. Then, as the lukewarm blood dried and cooled on her, she started running.

It was a need to be clean that drove her. A need to wash away both the guilt and the death off herself. She wasn't watching where she was going, but she didn't care. She hit a tree, a few low-slung branches, and tripped on more than just a few rocks.

No physical pain reacher her past the brokenness of her insides.

Doug had just died in front of her, then came back. As if he didn't have any recollection of who she was - he had come after her.

_Was this how the rest of the world had had to face things? To deal with?_

Glen choked as she knelt by the stream. The water was too fast to see her reflection but that was an oddly calming thought. Especially as she dunked her head into the stream and scrubbed. Using rocks, moss, and whatever she could get her hands on to rub Doug off of herself.

Even as she felt her skin, the smoothness under her fingertips, as she rose from the water she still felt dirty. Soiled. It was deep beneath her skin and it wouldn't be scrubbed off easily.

But Glen had to try.

Off came her jacket, then her shirt, followed by her pants as she stood in the stream in nothing but a bra and underwear. Water lapping at her shins. Her clothing was all things she had stolen from a store, on account of the fact she had run from the city in nothing but her jogging clothes; so she didn't care that they were dirty. The fact that they had been touching her had been the hard part to grasp. Her brain, short-circuiting as it was, couldn't stand the fact that Doug had been on her clothes and she needed it gone.

Glen scrubbed her skin. Scoured it until it was red. Both to rid herself of the filth and to dig deep into the bone, trying to rub out the guilt and agony that was stabbing her in the heart. Denial was a close second, but she didn't want that gone.

_Oh, why did it __**hurt**__?_ Doug had just been a kid she'd found in a cornfield. He wasn't supposed to have this kind of pull on her life, even after his own had ended. The dead were supposed to stay dead, and far away from her. So why did she feel so damn much for that stupid kid?

He'd gotten bitten and caused a hell of a lot more trouble than he had been worth, but Glen couldn't stamp him out of her mind. He was like an infection. Perhaps even more deadly than the one that had ended his own life.

She stayed in the frigid water for almost ten minutes, non-stop scrubbing and dunking herself. She'd collapsed, knees dipping low into the water as she had tried her hardest to become better. Before she felt semi-human. Allowed herself to be called human again. There was still the overwhelming need to feel _clean_, but somehow Glen accepted that she never would be.

Back in her right mind, Glen looked up towards the shore for her clothes. Dirty as they were, she would need them until she could raid another store. Or the truck. Only to find Daryl standing against a tree, a few feet away from her pile of soiled garments. Watching her.

Glen was a shy person most of the time. Social interaction was a new thing, especially in this new world without Doug or most people. But having the kid dead for only half an hour at most just s_napped somethi_ng in her.

_Who cared if Daryl saw her half naked?_ It was the end of the world. Who cared if she was dripping more than those teenagers at wet-tshirt competitions?** It was the end of the world. **They'd probably see more outrageous things later down the line. If not already. Plus, Glen childishly acknowledged that 'it was the end of the world' excuse worked for everything. Including hunger, sadness, and lack of good clothing.

"What're you doing here?" Glen asked, stepping out onto the bank. The sandy shore was grimy beneath her toes, and it actually felt pleasant.

Daryl shrugged. "Ya forgot to bring a gun or somethin' to defend yer'self."

Glen paused as she gathered up her clothes, feet away from the rogue hunter. Seeing how soiled most of her garments were, she threw them away. Far into the bushes. She had forgotten. She'd been so caught up in the death of Doug that she had actually forgotten about the fact that he was not the only Walker around.

_How cliche._ Glen groaned to herself.

"Crap." She mumbled, not even bothering to put on her clothes. She had some extra's in the truck, why bother with getting dirty again when she was getting new clothes on? "Sorry."

Daryl only raised his eyebrow condescendingly.

"So what wus the kid to ya?" The redneck walked beside her back to the truck. "Didn't much look like yer kid. Unless ya got som' red in yer hair I don't see."

Glen actually managed to snort. "Some kid I found in a field."

That didn't nearly sum up her feelings on the matter, but it was the truth. Without all the flowery words attached.

"Seriously?" Daryl took his turn to chuckle darkly, which was more of a snort than anything. "You just pick up strays or somethin'?"

"Or something."

"Yer crazy."

Glen was curious why he would think that. "Why?"

"The world ends and ya go pick up sum' kid? Not my first thought, is all."

They'd reached the truck, with Doug still hanging out the back of the truck bed. Dead and falling slowly out. It was surreal. Neither of them moved towards him. Glen out of shock and some hard won self control and Daryle because he had no business to the kids dead body.

"I was lonely," Glen didn't have any reason to lie. This Daryl character knew enough about her anyway. No reason to put on false airs. "He was alone. No one would miss him. He would have died without me."

Yet he had still died.

Looking at the headless corpse, it was almost too easy to imagine that it wasn't Doug. That Doug had just decided to up and leave, instead of die like he had. The clothes were the same, but without the face it was so simple to just... imagine a better end.

And that's what Glen did.

"Could'a found better company than a ginger - even Ah'm not that desperate."

Oh come now. He couldn't be that racist-

She took a double-take of the situation.

Desperate?

Glen's heart clenched dangerously as she watched the dead body hit the ground. She felt far away from the situation.

_What did that mean...? _He couldn't honestly be insinuating- he didn't want her to come... with him... right?

He'd hardly made it seem like he had wanted her, but with him showing up out of the blue like he had... had he been looking for her? Was that why he was here?

"Desperate enough for company with an asian?" She had to try. She'd beat herself up if she didn't.

Daryl looked her over, Glen could feel even with her back turned. She was still half naked, just now searching through the truck's cab for some clothes. She found a shirt, and some pants, but no jacket. So that meant she was going to have to keep hers until she found a new one. Or stole it.

Whichever came first. Just like everything else.

"Ah might be." Daryl asked said, as if he had thought over every single angle of her being with him. Glen paused in pulling her pants up to look at him. "Ya any good at hunting?"

"I've never been hunting... but I'm fast. Before I met D-Doug," Would the pain ever leave? "I had managed just fine on my own."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Was he thick?

"I'm good at scouting. Never hunted." Glen clarified.

There was a thoughtful look to him.

"Well, if ye're gonna be running with the Dixon's, ya gotta learn."

"Alright-"

Dixon's? Was that his last name? It fit him -

... Why the hell was it **plural**?

* * *

"Well-he-_Hello _there, honey."

Big, burly and head practically was the first impression Glen received of Daryl _Dixon_'s brother. And as he drew closer, threw an arm around her shoulder, the fact that his breath stunk was close second.

"Name's-" He was pushed off Glen by Daryl.

_Oh. Dear. God. _Glen thought to herself somewhat stunned. _What the hell have I gotten myself into?_

"Come'on Merle, lay off." Daryl shoved his brother away from being right up in Glen's face. "This is the chick Ah was talking about. On the roof? Useless ginger that was with her got chomped so she'll be with us."

There were two rednecks now. Brothers. And they looked nothing alike. One was burly and huge and the other slight and well muscled. It was almost more of a shock than Doug's death and the leaving of his body behind. Deliberate so she could refuse to believe he was dead.

"Ehm- hi?" Glen squeaked before clearing her throat. Catching the attention back to herself.

"Awww, ain't she cute." Merle gushed, leering at Glen enough that she was decidedly uncomfortable.

"So why'd you follow little daryl-enia back here? Ya two getting it on or som-"

"No." Glen said horrified at the implications.

"Fur the love of- Merle, shut it woulda ya?" Daryl advised with a low stare. "We ain't doing nothing."

She nodded quickly in agreement.

"Let 'er talk fer herself, Daryl." Merle stated, pushing his brother away and consequently getting closer to Glen. "Pretty little thing like her knows what she wants. Ain't that right..."

He stumbled with himself as if just now realizing she hadn't given her name.

"Uh, what's yer-"

His face was comically confused. He looked like a pug that wasn't quite sure how to deal with the situation presented to him.

Glen rolled her eyes, becoming a little more comfortable with the outrageous man. So far she could peg him as a pervert, but pretty easy going. There wasn't exactly a kindness to him and he was far from harmless: yet - he was something altogether different than anything she had ever known. He was still a huge man, but he was... safe?

As long as Daryl was around. Daryl hadn't seemed so bad, so she was going to give the bigger a man a chance.

"Name's Glen." She said with more moxie than she was feeling.

"Look'it! She can speak for herself." Merle announced, as if Daryl hadn't heard her speak before. "So why'd ya follow my brotha? Got the hots for him? Cause if so you're not chasing the right brother-"

He made a show of his muscles, which as impressive as they were, did not retract from his teeth.

"It was a better option than being alone?" Glen tried cutting in, leaning against the truck's side, more than a little uncomfortable with the direction of conversation.

It wasn't often people questioned if she liked someone. Especially when most people were Walkers.

"I guess that works. He tell you anything about me?" Merle asked.

Glen answered honestly. "I didn't even know he had a brother until we drove over here."

"What?" Merle snarled, facing his brother. "How could ya forget me? What are family for if yar just gonna throw 'em under the bus?"

Daryl was unamused.

"Maybe Ah didn't want to scare away two other survivors? Kind of stuck on a roof wit 'em. Didn't much wanna talk."

"Oh really-"

Apparently that was good enough for Merle because he and Daryl started bickering about something or another. Why she hadn't been told of the amazing person named Merle. A city. A buck they missed. A trap that was full. Anything and everything. Daryl poking at the fire while Merle cleaned a gun. It hit her then that Daryl had always had backup. The car alarms going off suddenly made a lot of sense. A distraction, probably planned if the other brother didn't show up.

The two brothers settled down against two separate logs, across each other from the fire.

They didn't even try to make room for her, but that almost was better than if they had. She was welcome, but she had to work for it. It wasn't outright said, but she understood it. It was an eat or get eaten world. It gave her mind something to do, too. Beside think of Doug.

Damn it. She was thinking about him again.

Pushing Doug out of her mind, she joined in to the twosome throng. Plopping next to Merle on the stump. He didn't even look at her, just continued on cleaning his gun and talking with Daryl. It wasn't to be mean or anything, Glen understood, but she knew she had to do something to keep her mind occupied.

She tried to observe the situation as she saw it. It seemed as if the two brothers got along as well as they could. The cursing was more lovingly thrown at each other than not, and they had a strange way to see if the other was hurt. Glen had seen enough of what she had deemed 'macho' behavior to know that these two had it down like an art.

It took a little while, after the brothers had simply stopped talking except to throw a few insults at each other that Glen felt marginally better about saying something.

So she decided to start by asking a simple question.

"You know how to work one of these?" As she pulled out a gun from her bag. All Glen knew about it was that it was a shotgun of some kind, other than that- she was lost. Maybe getting help would make her seem like less of a threat. And more part of their strange little group.

"You ain't scared of me? Arh ya?" Merle asked first, as if testing her.

Glen raised an eyebrow. "Terrified."

Merle snorted a laugh. "I like you."

Glen simply smiled, glad to make the man amused.

Perhaps she should have been scared of these two strangers she now found herself in front of, but she couldn't manage it. Doug's death had taken all the caution out of her system. For now, anyway. Perhaps tomorrow she would feel differently about it. But for today. Tonight...

The Dixon's didn't seem to mind either. It seemed they'd been judged much too much already. Unless they stabbed her in the back, she wasn't going to do anything rash.

The fact that she was a girl apparently already made her less of a threat than anything else.

"You're in for a treat then, honey," Merle announced, looking over the gun she handed him. "'Cause I know everythin' there is to know about these here guns-"

And Glen settled down for the ride. Listening as Merle started to explain about how guns worked, something nobody had actually ever taken the time to explain to her. He mentioned what to look for when actually using the sight, how to hold it, and what shooting really entailed.

Daryl sat on the opposite side of the fire, watching them.

There was a calmness to the atmosphere that Glen had been sorely missing. Like a balm for a sore spot, that was still festering.

Perhaps, tomorrow, she would remember this feeling.

* * *

So what do you guys think?

I'm hoping to skip a bit next chapter and get straight into the Camp life that we all know and love :D The dynamic of Daryl and Glen's relationship will also become more... substantial next time. I am hoping!

-Jayrose


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